Archive for 2015

Spring is Coming to Tillamook at least some days it seems so. Mauricio and I made a drive up the river to visit friends and family in The Dalles and spring was just arriving there.

We discovered that the Cherry Blossoms were just coming into Bloom near The Dalles. We also took a walk on the Riverfront Trail along the river, (The children rode bicycles and the adults walked.) Spring was just getting started here as the buds were about ready to spring into life on the branches of the trees along the waters edge.

After the ride the three children enjoyed a frolic in the park where we had parked the car.

Gretchen and some of her coworkers ran the Three Capes Relay Marathon yesterday. It was a beautiful day and the course ran thru many parks along the coast. I was invited to ride in the car and take photos.

Tillamook has had mostly beautiful weather this month, with a few rainy days, while the east coast is freezing and covered in a thick layer of snow. Toward the end of the month the spring bulbs are not only coming up but many are already in bloom. The High School here had their 10 day fundraiser activities during the middle of the month and we attended almost all the dinners put on by the 4 classes, many just required us to walk across the street to the great facility at the Nazarene Church.

I have already started mowing the lawn which is not yet growing fast enough to require a weekly mowing but getting close. The trees are budding out but too early and a late frost may be really bad now. Also no bees yet to do the pollination work so I expect that the fruit trees will be happy and empty of produce this year. With the two days of rain that are currently falling I have transplanted lots of ground cover to a hillside at Gretchen’s house and she has sprinkled wild flower seeds. We are hoping for a dumpy hillside to turn to a pretty one this spring.

Pancake supper at church a week ago was a super success. I washed lots of dishes with much help including both Ginger and Bill. The homemade applesauce that was served with it was a real treat. Two members of the church pealed all the apples and made it last fall just for this event.

We actually did not get back to Tillamook until late in the month after spending two weeks getting there. Out first stop had been San Diego to visit Bill’s brother. Then on to Lake Forest so that Bill could spend a week actually at work. He has been working from home for the last three+ years and only makes occasional trips to the plant in Southern California. This is actually only his second trip there since he started working in October 2011. While there, we had dinner with Bill’s cousin Kris that he had not seen since he was a child and drove to Carlsbad to have dinner with my brother Rick’s two boys (Brett and Andy) and their family.

My sister Nancy and all of her family were in Oceanside for the following weekend to celebrate Nancy’s birthday. We joined them and I got to meet up with my nieces and nephew that I had not seen since they were young children and I finally got to meet all of their children who were the ages that I had last seen their parents. We had a fun family dinner at the Crab Shack at the harbor.

From there we drove to The Dalles, Oregon following much of the old US395 route which kept us on the desert side of the mountains. We were both surprised at how empty the land was in that area of Northern California and eastern Oregon. It was a very pretty, peaceful drive thru barren high desert country. Staying with our friends in The Dalles we caught up on happenings in our old home town. I did have a lunch with my two sisters that are still living The Dalles and caught up on their happenings before making the final drive to Tillamook and home.

Yesterday we drove north from San Diego to Lake Forest and checked into a hotel for the week so that Bill can spend a week actually at work. We drove along the coast driving thru many of our childhood haunts and noting the growth that has taken place in the many intervening years.

Today we drove north on the coast from here to Huntington Beach before heading east to the freeway and back south to the hotel. Tomorrow is the College football playoff game and since the University of Oregon is one of the contestants we spent some time driving around this local area looking for a sport bar where we can watch the game. GO DUCKS!

ESPN will have the game on and since we get that channel in our hotel room we may end up just enjoying the game from the comfort of our current hidey hole.